Stereoselective synthesis enamine catalysis

In contrast to the early report of intramolecular desymmetrization reactions [6], the intramolecular ring-closing reactions of achiral substrates via enamine catalysis were not disclosed until the beginning of the twenty-first century. In 2003, list reported the first highly stereoselective intramolecular aldol reaction of achiral dicarbonyl compounds. Cyclic aldol products 6a-< were delivered from heptanedials 5 with excellent diastereo- and enantioselectivity by the catalysis of L-proline (Scheme 36.2). The cyclization of ketoaldehyde 7 afforded alcohol 8 as a 2 1 diastereomeric mixture but with 99% ee. This strategy could provide P hydroxyl carbonyl derivatives that are of potential applications in organic synthesis [7aj. 

Beyond the organic chemists initial imagination, two unique interconvertible enamine and iminium activation modes have produced a number of unprecedented powerful cascade processes in the formation of diverse complex stractures with high efficiency and excellent stereoselectivities. This not only expands the scope of amino catalysis significantly, but more important, affords new and efficient synthetic methods in organic synthesis. It is expected that new cascade reactions with activation modes will continue to be developed to meet the synthetic danand. 

The enamine (/dienamine)-iminium cycle-specific cascade catalysis is an important constituent of amine-catalyzed cascade reactions [10]. This strategy has been explored extensively and also applied to natural product synthesis. One such example is the total synthesis of dihydrocorynantheol, which was first isolated from the bark of Aspidosperma marcgravianum in 1967 [29]. This indole alkaloid is a member of the corynantheine and was found to exhibit antiparasitic, antiviral, or analgetic activities, which have attracted considerable attention from the synthetic community. Among those reported total syntheses, Itoh et al. developed a Mannich-Michael cascade reaction catalyzed by L-proline 52 for the total synthesis of ent-dihydrocorynantheol 54 (Scheme 3.8) [30], The cascade reaction of 3-ethyl-3-buten-2-one 51 with dihydro-P-carboline 50 catalyzed by 30mol% of (S)-proline afforded the tetracyclic core structure 53 in 85% yield. Excellent stereoselectivity was achieved in this cascade reaction (99% enantiomeric excess and almost complete diastereomeric control). Therefore, this organocascade reaction could lead expeditiously to construction of the core structure, which enabled the authors to accomplish the total synthesis of enl-dihydrocorynantheol 54 in just five steps. 

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